Mobility

A handful of vendors have created a trial version for ARM-based servers of the OpenStack cloud computing software now available for testing online. The open source offering fills in another small piece of software puzzle for the low power architecture working its way into the data center.

ARM server SoC designer Calxeda worked with open software specialist Canonical and Hewlett-Packard to create a version of the TryStack for ARM hosted by Core NAP. Dell, Equinix, NTT and Rackspace Hosting also supported the work which is based on the Essex release of OpenStack...

Business management and ERP have undergone huge technological, social and economic shifts. The explosion of cloud computing, mobility of business users, Big Data demands and microscopic focus on cost cutting are changing the pace and direction of every company's IT strategy.

Five years ago cloud computing was more expensive than on-premise, analytical data was difficult to curate and the benchmark in usability, especially on mobile devices, was set extremely low. Today's advances in these areas create massive opportunities for large and small businesses to take advantage of the best tools, infrastructure and user interfaces modern technology has to offer...

Migrating applications is not a trivial process. Whether you want to move apps from on-premises infrastructure to the cloud or distribute them across multiple cloud providers, you'll face obstacles. Moving virtual machines, migrating data and configuring networks can all create friction in the app migration process.

Migrating data from one cloud platform to another can be a substantial challenge.

Moving virtual machines. You have several options when migrating virtual machines (VMs) between an on-premises infrastructure and the cloud: using a shared machine image format, importing or rebuilding...

What are we to make of the "mobile cloud," and is it something midmarket enterprises should be focused on?

It's self-evident, I suppose, that mobile cloud computing implies a cloud architecture geared to serving mobile connections. Let's take a look at an academic definition:

MCC is an amalgam of three foundations, namely cloud computing, mobile computing, and networking. The most promising and intriguing characteristics of MCC paradigm are mobility and rich functionality. We define mobile cloud computing as "a rich mobile computing technology that leverages unified elastic resources of varied clouds and network technologies toward unrestricted functionality, storage, and mobility..."

That's a definition offered by researchers at the University of Malaya's Mobile Cloud Computing Research Lab, and it has the merits of being both current and clear. Their 2012 paper on the subject, from which the definition is taken, is well worth reading in full...

Microsoft is buying Perceptive Pixel Inc. (PPI), which makes large-scale, multi-touch displays, a new hardware line for the software giant.

Terms were not disclosed. 3M is understood to be an investor in PPI.

Kurt DelBene, president of Microsoft's Office Division, said in a statement Monday that "PPI's large touch displays, when combined with hardware from our OEMs, will become powerful Windows 8-based PCs and open new possibilities for productivity and collaboration."...

With 55% of employees now using their smartphones at work, 42% of all companies want to leverage the BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) workplace and launch mobile sales applications to seek a competitive advantage. These user-centric survey results and other cloud-based trends are now available in a Yankee Group whitepaper commissioned by FeedHenry, the developer of cloud-based mobile application solutions. “The Cloud Pushes Enterprise Mobile Applications Up a Gear” whitepaper notes that 87 percent of all companies believe that cloud computing will play a significant role in their IT infrastructure within the next year.

Having recently won first place in the E-Tech Awards at CTIA for Enterprise and Vertical Market Solutions, FeedHenry is well-positioned to address the market pain with a Platform as a Service solution (PaaS). FeedHenry’s mobile application platform gives enterprises an easier way to build, deploy and integrated mobile apps for businesses and manage the entire cloud-based ecosystem. This strategic advantage can provide companies with a rapidly deployed solution because the top three IT priorities cited by the Yankee Group survey are:...

A lot of the developers trying to create mobile computing applications today don’t have a lot of experience with the backend server technologies needed to deploy a robust mobile computing application. And yet, when you look at the backend services required for any mobile computing application, they tend to be very similar.

Applicasa has turned that realization into a cloud-based service that masks all the complexity associated with building and deploying databases for mobile computing applications. The Applicasa service presents developers with a drag-and-drop interface for creating the database and custom queries in about 10 minutes. Once database objects and queries have been set up, Applicasa generates a customized software development kit that converts database objects to the native development environment without requiring manual coding...

It’s no secret: companies large and small are scrambling for growth. And as businesspeople turn over every last stone in that quest, they can’t afford to spend all their time chasing down information. They need their information to catch up to them. Operational agility is key, and it’s rooted in the ability to communicate and collaborate with anyone, anytime, anywhere.

That requires mobile technology — smartphones, tablets, laptops — and companies are busy supplying it. In a research report published this past March, titled “Uncrossing the Wires: Starting — and Sustaining — the Conversation on Technology Value,” CFO Research asked both CFOs and IT executives what technologies would be most important for their companies’ success within the next three years. Nine out of 10 (89%) answered mobility, the use of mobile devices...